Introducing the Exchange Solution

To address the needs of Exchange performance monitoring, Mercury Interactive offers Exchange solutions. The SiteScope Exchange Solution provides efficient and thorough monitoring of performance, availability, and usage statistics for Microsoft Exchange 5.5, 2000, and 2003 servers.

This solution uses a solution template you use to rapidly deploy a collection of monitors configured with default metrics, default thresholds and proactive tests. These monitoring configurations have been researched using best practice data and expertise from various sources.

Note: You must have the applicable SiteScope option license to use the Exchange Solution templates. Contact your Mercury sales representative for more information about Solution licensing.

The purpose of a solution template is to provide easy-to-use, comprehensive Exchange monitoring without requiring the SiteScope user or the IT organization to be experts on the application. Benefits of the Exchange solution template include:

Reduces the need for Exchange performance domain expertise
Reduces the time to configure and deploy Exchange monitors
Helps identify both real-time performance bottlenecks and longer term trends
Adds no overhead to production systems

The Exchange solution template deploys monitors that target the following aspects of Exchange performance and health:

Basic server/OS performance
This category refers to the system level health of a server. The Exchange Solution Template automatically configures monitors for server health.
Application performance
Application performance is a measure of how well specific Exchange components are functioning. The Exchange Solution Template automatically configures monitors for a list of important Exchange application components.
Mail protocol response time
Perhaps the most important aspect and key indicator of Exchange performance is mail protocol response time. While Exchange can utilize many protocols, MAPI is common.
Usage statistics
The last category related to Exchange performance is usage. While usage in and of itself is not necessarily a key indicator of performance, changes in usage can affect overall Exchange performance. In addition, Exchange usage statistics help IT organizations spot trends and plan for the future. The Exchange Solution Template automatically configures monitors for a list of important Exchange usage parameters.